Industrial Agroforestry: Perspectives and Prospectives

The Forests are playing a significant role in the economic prosperity and ecological stability of the country. The Indian Forests faces severe biotic and abiotic pressure leads to shrinking of its geographical distribution and the forest based industries are at the cross roads. The rate of deforestation at an alarming rate of 1.5 million ha year-1 and has fortunately come down rapidly with the enactment of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980. Currently, the forest area in the country is around 23.81 per cent and in Tamil Nadu, it is around 18.16 per cent which is much low against the mandated requirement of 33.0 per cent. Not only is the forest wealth of the country very poor but also its productivity in terms of Mean Annual Increment (MAI) is also one of the lowest. The less forest area coupled with the low productivity of Indian forest has ushered in a total mismatch between the demand and supply of both domestic and industrial wood requirement.

The scientific team of industrial agroforestry consortia of Forest College and Research Institute has brought out a book on “Industrial Agroforestry: Perspectives and Prospectives” to address the needs of stake holders at all levels of Production to Consumption System. This book incorporated the India’s Forest and Agroforestry situation and the need for industrial wood plantations. It also comprises the status of various wood based industries like pulp and paper, plywood, matchwood, dendro power, biofuel and the requirement for different raw materials and the associated supply chain management. The incorporation of Tree Improvement, Clonal Forestry, Precision Silviculture, Profitable Agroforestry Models, Supply and Value Chain Management and Price Forecasting are some of the needed information addressed in this book which would be very useful to all wood based industrial persons, academicians and researchers of SAUs, ICAR, ICFRE Institutes, graduating students, practicing foresters, professional foresters and forest entrepreneurs.

Contents: Preface. 1. Wood based industries. 2. Industrial agroforestry – A value chain approach in Tamil Nadu. 3. Timber industries. 4. Pulp and paper industries in India – a status. 5. State of poplar and plywood industry in North-western states. 6. Biofuel industries in India. 7. Biomass briquetting technology for industrial agroforestry residues. 8. New generation wood composite. 9. Varietal development and registration of industrial wood species. 10. Principles and practices of tree seed handling techniques. 11. Biotechnological approaches for improvement and utilization of industrial wood genetic resources. 12. Precision silviculture . 13. Profitable agroforestry models for industrial wood species. 14. Alternate industrial wood species. 15. Integrated nutrient management. 16. Water management for industrial tree species. 17. Role of biofertilizers in productivity improvement of industrial wood species. 18. Insect pest management in industrial agro-forestry. 19. Integrated disease management. 20. Mechanization in forestry operations. 21. Yield prediction models for Casuarina- a pulp wood species. 22. Marketing and trade of industrial wood species in India. 23. Price forecasting in industrial wood species. 24. Participatory extension approaches towards sustainable industrial agroforestry.